mixed bag
by Dorminchu
Summary: The best moment of Arthur Fleck's life never happens; but perhaps it's better to pretend. [Joker, 2019]


Stumbling towards home on legs that trembled with an innocent thrill despite the outward nature of his distress. He'd scrubbed most of the paint off by then, but he couldn't erase the guilt from his posture or the lingering taste of iron; his teeth stained red and his nostrils caked with dry blood. In the same moment it struck him how easier it would be not to return to his mother, but _Sophie—fifteen minutes later, he was knocking on the door to her apartment; looking down at her with the blood singing in his ears and his pulse still jumpy from the thrill of his previous encounter and, despite all of this, or perhaps because of it, took his first step forward, leaned down and kissed her like a well-adjusted adult who didn't need seven different prescriptions to function._

_She never said a word, but he didn't need to hear it. This was safe—_

—jolted abruptly by the oncoming pedestrians—Arthur flinched, biting his tongue and retasting the same copper on his teeth. Sophie would ask too many questions if he showed up now, because she had more than herself to look after, and she wasn't as fucked up; that was what he liked about her. Of course, he didn't want to impose his company on the daughter—

—_he remembered staring at the daughter more than Sophie, trying to imagine what a real parent's warmth felt like until the feeling curdled and he'd had to look away._

That was still the highlight of his week, and perhaps the best moment of his life, because it had never happened at all; leaving an infinite space for as many possible-or-impossible outcomes as he could conjure in the minutes before arrival at his apartment—riding the train, on the bus, walking, undisturbed tonight or the night after.

_In less than a week he'd learned when she got up every morning—six-thirty—and when she left her child to go to work—eight-fifty-five—he'd followed her once, to the towering office building she worked at but did not go inside the revolving glass door—he was curious, that was all, excited and anxious to know if she'd ever ask him why he did it._

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, he boarded the elevator; the woman inside he did not recognize visibly shuddered at the sight of him. Arthur had no idea what he looked like to the outside world.

He tried to think of a joke to lighten the mood, but he didn't know what he should say. She'd probably think he was being strange. It _was_ strange, feeling something other than tacit resentment towards another person that was not the subject of his endearment. Well, besides Gary, but they weren't friends in the same way as Sophie Dumond. Even her name sounded pleasant. He could think around the syllables as many times as he wanted and no one would know, and his thoughts became the woman in the elevator: _Sophie Dumond,_ smiling, placing the finger-gun to her temple while her daughter wasn't looking, in a rare instance of mutual empathy—

"Hey, uh. Aren't you getting off on this floor?"

Arthur realized he was humming aloud. The jittery feeling hadn't gone away and the gun was a cold, reassuring weight in his pocket as he exited the compartment.

* * *

His mother could be nicer in the right mood, if he didn't come home too late. At first he thought she was asleep again, but she turned when he closed the door and locked up behind himself. She was, in fact, only somewhat alarmed—"Oh God, Arthur, your face. Did someone do that to you?"

Arthur swallowed dryly, his grip white-knuckled on the edge of the medicine cabinet; he hadn't realized how badly he was shaking even now, and said, "No, mom—I just tripped, is all." Afterwards his mother ignored the blood around his nose and he likewise convinced her to change the channel from the news to their favorite oldies station; that was their understanding. A real mother would have persisted.

Later, it was nice to have someone else to think about in the dingy apartment complex, alone in the bed next to his mother who could sleep just fine with or without him; Arthur was restless, but his anger had dispersed, leaving a strange warmth between his ribs.


End file.
